“Alright, alright, alright…just keep living,” actor Matthew McConaughey’s chirped at the end of his 2014 Best Actor Oscar speech.
Not so coincidentally, those first three words — his character Wooderson’s catchphrase from 1993’s Dazed and Confused — were splashed across shirts from McConaughey’s Just Keep Living (JKL) clothing line.
The shirts quickly sold out after his win, but just months earlier the brand awareness for JKL was low and consumers weren’t making the connection between the clothing line and the soon-to-be Oscar winner.
That’s when Vancouver’s 6S Marketing stepped in to ramp up a social media campaign.
“The timing happened to be really good, but certainly Matthew McConaughey’s popularity was increasing dramatically, just with the popularity of Dallas Buyers Club and then with TV show True Detective,” 6S president Chris Breikss told Business In Vancouver.
His company began managing the JKL brand in November 2013 — right in the midst of Oscar season, when film studios roll out the movies they hope will secure nominations.
The brand’s licensee, Grand National Apparel out of Toronto, enlisted 6S for search engine marketing and pay-per click advertising in a bid to boost brand awareness.
“In the early stages, we really focused on a direct response campaign and marketing strategy,” Breikss said.
“As the relationship grew with the client, we started looking at what other channels we could utilize to increase brand awareness.”
In February — just weeks before the 2014 Oscars — 6S’s research concluded the company should begin targeting people who were already discussing McConaughey through social media like Twitter (NYSE:TWTR) and Facebook (NASDAQ:FB).
The goal was to seize on the fans who’d be on their smartphones or tablets while watching the Oscars on TV.
“But we knew just utilizing social media on its own wasn’t going to be enough and so we allocated an ad budget to then amplify the social media,” Breikss said.
In the days leading up to the awards, the company launched pre-written tweets and posts through social media, paying Facebook and Twitter to boost the activity on users feeds.
During the JKL campaign, the number of Facebook likes and Twitter followers each grew from about 300 to 3,000.
And on the night of the Oscars, employees were engaging with fans and replying to tweets as the award show carried on.
One particular tweet suggesting McConaughey eat a “Dallas Buyers Club Sandwich” was picked up by MTV News — which described the post as “questionable” — and brand awareness picked up dramatically.
The shirt sold out in the 24 hours following the media coverage and McConaughey’s win. But the social media campaign continued into March as people began posting photos of themselves wearing JKL shirts featuring the "Alright, alright, alright" catchphrase.
“We’ve run similar types (of) celebrity campaigns in the past but this one was on a different scale,” Breikss said.
In a blog post on the University of B.C.'s website, Sauder School of Business marketing and behavioural science professor Julio Viskovich said Twitter has the potential to be the most effective means of getting one’s brand out there on Oscar night.
“Social media activity surges during the Oscars and provides an avenue for brands and general audiences to engage in real time while the awards are going on. This has changed the way the world watches the event,” he said on the February 19 blog post.
“If the Super Bowl is a place where brands show off their newest commercials, the Oscars is where brands can show off their wit and capitalize on the real-time buzz created on social media. The Oscars allows for brands to add colour throughout the entire show. Brands have to humanize themselves and the Oscars provide a perfect venue for brands to do this.”
@reporton
